Category: Images

When I was a teenager in my home country of Bangladesh the only thing I knew about Finland was that it’s the land of Nokia.

After completing my bachelor’s in electronics I worked as a journalist for 3 years, I then decided to come to Finland to pursue a master’s at the University of Oulu.

I observed a number of interesting characteristics about Finland in my first 12 months of living here and I present them below…

1. The virtue of being punctual

In Finland everything happens on time. Finns rigorously practice punctuality and expect others to do the same. Want to annoy a Finn? Then be late a full of excuses.

2. Girls are noticeably safe in public

The Bangladeshi society grapples with the perennial problem of street harassment of women. It’s typically not safe for women to go outside alone at night. On the contrary, Finland seems to be a safe haven for women. Women can dress as they please without the threat of verbal harassment.

3. The precious sun

Growing up in a tropical country has allowed me to grow accustomed to the predictability of the sun. The only seasonal exception is winter when the sun is slightly less intense. Finland forces you to become incredibly fond of the sun and its elusive tendencies.

4. Free Wi-Fi

The indispensability of mobile phones in everyday life is essential. The Internet has made communications easier and the convenience of using the internet is greatly amplified when you can connect to free Wi-Fi hotspots in public places throughout Finland.

5. Wherever you go, nature steals the show

Finland is Europe’s most forested country. Helsinki and its condensed population have easy access to the surrounding nature. The abundance of water is another key feature of Finland, which is why Finland is known as the land of a thousand lakes. It was a pleasant shock moving from the concrete jungle of Bangladesh to the gorgeous greenery of Finland.

Photo: Michele Lawrence

6. The infrastructure is organized

I realized soon after moving that everything works systematically in Finland. Public transport is astonishingly punctual and businesses operate according to their announced schedules, which makes daily life hassle-free.

7. The food is flavorless

Finnish food is pretty bland and severely lacking in the spice department. I have tried to get used to Finnish food but I’m endlessly disappointed. The missing flavors seem to be replaced with a love for sugar, as Finns definitely have a sweet tooth.

8. English is widely accepted

Finns are among the top speakers of English as a second language in the world. In the big cities of southern Finland speaking English is not a problem, however, it’s impossible to integrate into the society without knowing Finnish. Sure you can speak English, but you cannot become part of Finnish society if you don’t learn Finnish.

9. Coffee & milk love

The Finns love for coffee is no secret. Finns drink tons of coffee according to the International Coffee Organization, so congratulations Finland, you’re the biggest coffee drinkers in the world! Finns also seem to have an admiration for milk. I was surprised to see that many adults drink milk with lunch…it’s not just for kids here!

10. Cars don’t honk

It’s a fact that having a car gives you greater mobility and when it comes to moving around in a sparsely populated country like Finland, a car is pretty essential. In comparison to Bangladesh where car’s honk nonstop, the Finnish roads are relatively quiet.

11. Expat Finns are easier to interact with

The expat Finns I have encountered, especially those who have lived in other countries where small talk is acceptable, are more friendly and open than others. Moreover, they don’t identify with the stereotypical definition of “reticent Finn” once they’ve returned to Finland. Concepts like “extreme personal space” or “public quietness” become obsolete to the expat Finn.

12. Silent Finland

Finns tend to enjoy the quiet and perhaps their surroundings influence this fact. The silence may feel mysteriously morbid at first, but once you adapt to it your focus can significantly improve…thus, Finland is a great place for writers!

Mahmudul Islam is a graduate student of wireless communications engineering at the University of Oulu.

Is the impending Finnish winter already clenching tightly on what’s left of your November soul? If so then check out these 5 winter activities that won’t add more chaos to your already insane inner monologue.

1. Indoor gardening

We all occasionally feel old inside, especially in winter. Now’s the time to embrace stereotypical hobbies that normal envelope elderly people. But instead of cleaning up after 85 cats, get yourself a million plants. Discovering new species of plants that will survive artificial sunlight is a beloved pastime in the north. It’s fun, reduces stress and makes you feel important. It’s also much cleaner and safer than having so many cats. Remind yourself that loving plants also means that you have no life.

2. Baking

Everyone loves the smell of freshly baked bread and if they don’t then there’s something intrinsically wrong with them. Once you learn how to bang out your own dough you won’t want the store-bought kind anymore, and what better way to spend your pent-up winter frustration than baking fresh pastries to keep all your plants company. Win.

3. Sauna

The classic and often intense sauna experience will put your mind on the mend. Trekking through giant heaps of snow is much more tolerable when you know the sauna awaits you with its warm, welcoming embrace. Give in to it, don’t fight it and you will finally understand the sauna’s winter allure — if only to defrost yourself. Don’t forget to sauna alone to avoid embarrassment because even after living in Finland for 10 years you still constantly screw up sauna etiquette. This probably means you are still wildly uncomfortable around random naked people.

4. Escape Room

(Skip if you have anxiety. Why not just nail your coffin shut right now?)

5. Ice fishing

Only for the brave at heart and for when your inner monologue needs a mind-numbing shock to shut the F up. Sitting on a camping stool over a frozen lake in the dead of winter is sure to grow hair just about everywhere, and feel totally natural. If you do catch something your fingers (and brain) will be so frozen that you won’t care what kind of fish it is anyway. This will undoubtedly make the foreigner Finn in you feel stupid, thus registering the whole bone-chilling experience as an awkward memory. But hey, it’s all about passing the time, right?

If all else fails just go to the bar.

Drink until May. Then remember it’s Vappu and you can’t stop now. If you’re still feeling guilty, just remind yourself that Donald Trump is still the POTUS and being in a constant state of slight inebriation is a perfectly acceptable form of coping.

While light manipulation within photography is nothing new, Hannu’s captivating photos are directly metaphorical to the country Hannu is from, Finland, setting his work apart from the rest.

Finland is no stranger to extreme darkness in the relentless winter months — the act of chasing light becomes a necessary skill for mental survival in the arctic — and this art form is a fitting adaptation of that notion.

Hannu Huhtamo – Terminus

I asked Hannu a few questions about his work, here’s what he had to say:

1. Is photography your first love?

Actually no, originally I’m a guitar player who accidentally got involved in long exposure photography. But since that day I’ve been totally hooked on light painting so I guess you can call it a love affair that turned into a long {term} relationship. While music has always been my great source of energy, light painting is more like a meditative state that helps me to concentrate on a moment.

Hannu Huhtamo – Lost and Lethal

2. Where in Finland are some of your favorite spots to shoot?

Usually I don’t have to go far away from Helsinki. The city outskirts can offer quite a lot of interesting locations if there’s just enough darkness for longer exposure times. To avoid light pollution I usually head up to Luukki recreation area in Espoo. Kruunuvuori ghost town is definitely one of my all time favorite spots in Helsinki. All the abandoned and collapsed villas offer a surreal scene for photography. It’s a shame that nowadays the place is almost gone.

Hannu Huhtamo – Bright Ambassadors

3. The contrast in your pieces is stunning, are you drawn to darkness you think?

Maybe a little, the balance between two sides is important. I find it interesting and also challenging to decide what details you want to emphasize with light.

In the spirit of Halloween, a time when children gather irreversible mental damage and adults get drunk in full costume without being labeled dangerously unstable, we’ve put together a pictorial shortlist of California’s most infamous serial killers to date.

These human abominations will hopefully not increase your preexisting anxiety, but will remind your dark side that California has fostered some unprecedented freaks. Our collection is packed with links to documentaries on Youtube, which are guaranteed to keep you captured for hours.

1. “The Night Stalker” Richard Ramirez – 1985-86

The composite sketch of the alleged attacker and his first moment of incarcerated fame aka, mugshot

Richard Ramirez is the essence of evil. He terrorized the streets of Los Angeles in the mid-1980’s and his recognizable police sketch is the stuff nightmares are made of. He died on death row at San Quentin State Prison in 2013.

The arraignment of The Night Stalker, who was a self-proclaimed satanist

Ramirez taunted the court room with chilling antics to pass the time

Groupies are not just for band members. Here’s one of Ramirez’s fans turned wife while Ramirez sat on Death Row

2. Charles Manson & Family: The Tate-LaBianca murders – 1968-1969

The infamous “family” at Spahn Movie Ranch, Los Angeles, CA

Charles Manson and family plotted their heinous murders right in the heart of the San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, at the infamous Spahn Movie Ranch (among other places), and this disturbing bunch changed how the summer of 1969 will be viewed forever.

3.The Toolbox Killers, Lawrence Bittaker and Roy Norris – 1979

Bittaker and Norris are responsible for the torture and murder of 5 teenage girls. It takes a special breed of psycho to commit these atrocities in a pair, yet there’s more couples who kill than you’d think.

Bittaker with fellow inmate and serial killer, William Bonin, aka The Freeway Killer

The most prolific of their time, these two pimps turned murderers had the LAPD scrambling for almost a year while they tossed bodies all over Los Angeles. Their rampageous run finally came to an end in 1978.

5. The Scorecard Killer, Randy Steven Kraft – 1972-1983

Randy Kraft left crabbed clues about his killing spree in a morbid “scorecard” for his own twisted pleasure. He has been linked to over 60 murders, mostly in California, and had southern Californians terrified for over a decade.

A sinister court smile

Kraft was pulled over in May 1983 after driving erratically, the officers found a dead Marine in his car

Dishonorable mention: Chowchilla kidnapping – 1976

A kidnapping and attempted murder of a school bus full of children in Chowchilla, California sets the disgust level particularly high on the abhorrent acts scale. By some surprising miracle everyone who was buried alive in this quarry escaped, and the perpetrators were captured.

We all cling desperately to warmer weather and scattered sunshine, but once those notions are gone for good with the encroaching winter months, it’s beneficial to have sanctuary spots in Helsinki where you can grasp onto your remaining sanity.

Every nationality has their own identifiable characteristics no matter how stereotypical they may sound. As a Finn I hardly recognize these behavioral traits in myself until I’m outside my home country, Finland. With this list you’re sure to never mistake a Finn for anyone else again, especially while traveling or residing abroad…

1. At first you won’t even spot us because Finns know how to lay low on the communal radar — virtually undetectable. You won’t hear us voicing loud opinions on public transportation.

2. But Finns are surely there. We’re super punctual. If an event starts at 10:00 a Finn will be there at 9:40. Tip: If there’s coffee, make it 9:20.

3. Finns are the grumpiest looking people in the group. Finns tend to have unreadable facial expressions all while avoiding excessive smiling. If we’re excessively smiling it’s most likely because you just told an inappropriate joke. We love questionable humor. Dark winters = dark humor?

4. Finns can be spotted awkwardly hovering around the coffeemaker drinking hideous amounts of coffee, no matter what time of day it is. It’s a way of staying awake during those dark winter months, and a habit we cannot switch off while abroad.

5. Apart from finishing our coffee before you, Finns will also finish their alcoholic beverages before you. A moderate drinker to Finns is a person with a problem to others. Be careful when you challenge a Finn to drink — you will lose and most likely be humiliated.

6. Don’t expect an extended amount of emotional small talk. Finns often answer in short and honest bursts after a momentary ponder. Alternatively, we will tell you our whole life story when asked: “how are you?” This is more rare than the first scenario and likely involves booze.

7. Finns look unfazed by chilly weather. If it’s above -20C then you won’t see Finns commenting on the cold. You will learn to stop asking us if we’re cold because the answer is always going to be “no.

8. But when it’s actually cold Finns are really good at dressing themselves. We’ve got all the right clothing for that. There’s no shame in wearing double layers of grandma’s wool mittens, scarves and/or sweaters…layering like a maniac is a must. It should take you over 20 annoying minutes to undress once you’ve come inside, or you’re not dressed warm enough.

If you happen to mistake someone for a Finn abroad even with this helpful list, then you failed. But hey, it’s a good start and they’re probably an awesome person anyway.

If you’re out and about in Finnish nature during late September throughout most of October, you might witness ruska. That’s a Finnish word for autumn colored foliage. In many places over the world, ruska puts up quite the show.

But due to the long, dark winter in Finland, ruska really is last call for enjoying nature. Unless you like stumbling around in the cold and dark. Which is totally okay, we’re not judging.

In any case, we went scouting Flickr’s community for some ruska goodness. This writer also pillaged his own archive if Instagram snapshots, for your enjoyment. So, whether you prefer the great outdoors in urban streetscapes or out in the middle of nowhere, we hope we can remind you to at least enjoy a few more strolls outside before the long grey dark sets in.

1. If you’re in luck puddles or lakes might remind you to look up at the trees.

20. And before you know it, you’ll just forget to enjoy your everyday surroundings. Moving outdoors becomes a tiresome chore, one which requires preparation.

21. Sure, those August and September sunsets are quite something.

22. They almost make you appreciate the looming darkness.

23. But by early November, a handful of pretty sunsets are among the few outposts of sanity you’ll have left. In Helsinki, you’ll miss the show if you don’t leave work between 4 and 5 pm. Farther up north, any typical office gig will leave you out of daylight.

34. This is the kind of nature sightings I like in fall: old NYC style taxis with campaign stickers for Dick Nixon.

35. Anyway, time to head out before everything looks like this.

Thomas Nybergh is a writer and producer for Ink Tank Media in Helsinki. He’s really into topics like information security, but he writes about anything. Occasionally, Thomas gets around to sharing photos on Instagram.

Sadly, regressive thinkers across Finnish society are playing straight into the hands of Turku’s knife-wielding assclown and his totalitarian ideology. On the interweb, people are inciting violence against “immigrants” (presumably anyone who isn’t melanin challenged).

Political opportunists in all ranks of government are falling over themselves cackling hysterically for the case of internet mass surveillance, which Finland might be facing due to a dangerous dangerous bill.

Someoone’s pleading for a change of a typo in the anti-sock Facebook group’s name

Internet nazis and their jihadi brethren

Violence against immigrants is nothing new, and vitriol against non-xenophobics is on the rise on social media. The Turku attack appears to have been targeting women. But curiously enough, Finnish women on the internet are getting threatened by Finnish men. You’d be excused for seeing curious parallels between Islamism and Western “white nationalism”.

In the following tweet, outspoken podcast host and feminist Iris Flinkkilä lists the conspicuously Finnish sounding names. These are people who’ve sent her death threats following anti-racist remarks regarding the Turku attack’s aftermath.

Unfortunately for him, he misspelled the Finnish neologism suvakki, a shortened slur for suvaitsevainen, literally “tolerant person”. The real implication being, that only bad people believe in basic human rights and working against structural oppression.

Don’t diss the spelling, diss the hate

Suffice to say, this edgelord got his social media phenomenon alright. But presumably, he didn’t expect resistant floods of tongue-in-cheek hate speech against socks, sukkia in Finnish.

That’s the the partitive plural form of sukka. In the original sentence, Terrorismin ja sukkien vastainen kansanliikeryhmä, genitive plural is used. Because Finnish grammar is fun like that.

Someone’s concerned about a wave of socks reaching Finland’s western border to Sweden, a country known for it’s sock ridden problem suburbs.

Shaming people for misspellings is a form of ableism. Spelling mistakes is a common symptom of dyslexia, a thing we, as professional writers, shouldn’t shame people for.

Likewise, implying that racism necessarily is a symptom of “low intelligence” is extremely rude to loving and caring individuals born with cognitive disabilities. So, we’re just going to sit back and analytical here, without additional puns. Because, let’s face it, screw this human asswipe and his hate.

By the way, does this case make anyone else think of the clown car KKK man from a couple of years back. He certainly put Finland on the map.

Authoritarian response to authoritarian attacks

With regard to the Turku attack, we have some additonal thoughts. As is customary with contemporary Islamist terrorism in the West, the threats were known by authorities. With more resources spent on, at a minimum, solid policework, counterintelligence/counterterrorism, with boring, human sources, this, and future attacks could perhaps be avoided.

This person forgot white socks in their washing machine, resulting in coloration during the next colored wash. SAD!

Internet mass surveillance, on the other hand is expensive, generates lots of false positives, particularly if the purpose is to do real time monitoring of terror threats. Surveillance is also a danger to democracy. Present day internet surveillance offers dangerous tools that Stasi could only have dreamed of.

The real use for internet mass surveillance is to build long-term dossiers on known individuals and to try and understand how other states work. Finland is becoming a nexus of internet traffic entering and leaving Russia, Finland’s beloved neighbor with it’s taiga equivalence of Saddam Hussein at the throne.

This includes Russian companies, like Yandex, building data centers in Finland, thanks to stable conditions and less sucky infrastructure.

People in the intelligence field who are also competent data scientists, are welcome to correct me on this.

When Western demographies adopt mass surveillance, citizens better sit down to think long and hard about how many paragraphs really protects us from slipping towards a model of China’s insane public-private partnership for “social credit”, combining government surveillance with commercial internet tracking. All in the name of safety, of course.

Someone rejoicing about leftists waking up to the threat of socks, as expressed by a rap music video titled “cut your socks”.

Sock the police?

Finnish police officers sure are granted immunity for petty ethnic profiling. Police are also mandated by law to engage in destructive nonsense like enforcing drug criminalization. Suffice to say that this writer is highly skeptical of glorification of police.

In this case in particular, Police displayed competence: The Turku assailant was stopped by a quick shot in the leg, mere minutes after starting his stabbing spree. During a press conference following the spree, police were careful about disclosing investigative findings prematurely.

But Minister of the Interior, Mrs. Paula Risikko immediately blurted out that the suspect was “foreign looking”. Nice.

Sadly, regressive thinkers across Finnish society are playing straight into the hands of Turku’s knife-wielding assclown and his totalitarian ideology. On the interweb, people are inciting violence against “immigrants” (presumably anyone who isn’t melanin challenged).

Political opportunists in all ranks of government are falling over themselves cackling hysterically for the case of internet mass surveillance, which Finland might be facing due to a dangerous dangerous bill.

Someoone’s pleading for a change of a typo in the anti-sock Facebook group’s name

Internet nazis and their jihadi brethren

Violence against immigrants is nothing new, and vitriol against non-xenophobics is on the rise on social media. The Turku attack appears to have been targeting women. But curiously enough, Finnish women on the internet are getting threatened by Finnish men. You’d be excused for seeing curious parallels between Islamism and Western “white nationalism”.

In the following tweet, outspoken podcast host and feminist Iris Flinkkilä lists the conspicuously Finnish sounding names. These are people who’ve sent her death threats following anti-racist remarks regarding the Turku attack’s aftermath.

Unfortunately for him, he misspelled the Finnish neologism suvakki, a shortened slur for suvaitsevainen, literally “tolerant person”. The real implication being, that only bad people believe in basic human rights and working against structural oppression.

Don’t diss the spelling, diss the hate

Suffice to say, this edgelord got his social media phenomenon alright. But presumably, he didn’t expect resistant floods of tongue-in-cheek hate speech against socks, sukkia in Finnish.

That’s the the partitive plural form of sukka. In the original sentence, Terrorismin ja sukkien vastainen kansanliikeryhmä, genitive plural is used. Because Finnish grammar is fun like that.

Someone’s concerned about a wave of socks reaching Finland’s western border to Sweden, a country known for it’s sock ridden problem suburbs.

Shaming people for misspellings is a form of ableism. Spelling mistakes is a common symptom of dyslexia, a thing we, as professional writers, shouldn’t shame people for.

Likewise, implying that racism necessarily is a symptom of “low intelligence” is extremely rude to loving and caring individuals born with cognitive disabilities. So, we’re just going to sit back and analytical here, without additional puns. Because, let’s face it, screw this human asswipe and his hate.

By the way, does this case make anyone else think of the clown car KKK man from a couple of years back. He certainly put Finland on the map.

Authoritarian response to authoritarian attacks

With regard to the Turku attack, we have some additonal thoughts. As is customary with contemporary Islamist terrorism in the West, the threats were known by authorities. With more resources spent on, at a minimum, solid policework, counterintelligence/counterterrorism, with boring, human sources, this, and future attacks could perhaps be avoided.

This person forgot white socks in their washing machine, resulting in coloration during the next colored wash. SAD!

Internet mass surveillance, on the other hand is expensive, generates lots of false positives, particularly if the purpose is to do real time monitoring of terror threats. Surveillance is also a danger to democracy. Present day internet surveillance offers dangerous tools that Stasi could only have dreamed of.

The real use for internet mass surveillance is to build long-term dossiers on known individuals and to try and understand how other states work. Finland is becoming a nexus of internet traffic entering and leaving Russia, Finland’s beloved neighbor with it’s taiga equivalence of Saddam Hussein at the throne.

This includes Russian companies, like Yandex, building data centers in Finland, thanks to stable conditions and less sucky infrastructure.

People in the intelligence field who are also competent data scientists, are welcome to correct me on this.

When Western demographies adopt mass surveillance, citizens better sit down to think long and hard about how many paragraphs really protects us from slipping towards a model of China’s insane public-private partnership for “social credit”, combining government surveillance with commercial internet tracking. All in the name of safety, of course.

Someone rejoicing about leftists waking up to the threat of socks, as expressed by a rap music video titled “cut your socks”.

Sock the police?

Finnish police officers sure are granted immunity for petty ethnic profiling. Police are also mandated by law to engage in destructive nonsense like enforcing drug criminalization. Suffice to say that this writer is highly skeptical of glorification of police.

In this case in particular, Police displayed competence: The Turku assailant was stopped by a quick shot in the leg, mere minutes after starting his stabbing spree. During a press conference following the spree, police were careful about disclosing investigative findings prematurely.

But Minister of the Interior, Mrs. Paula Risikko immediately blurted out that the suspect was “foreign looking”. Nice.